Hi, I really woul like some advice please. I'm a man and was with my partner for 6yrs we have 2 kids (one each) from separate relationships and were a blended family. She met a new female friend and over the next few months acted increasingly distant, for example, stopped spending time with me etc (i.e cancelled weekends away as was too busy etc), i felt things were weird so I asked and I was told I was jealous because she had a new friend. I felt bad about myself for this a couple months more and her friend (an ex police officer who now lead an environmental group and was incredibly controlling and mean to some people in the group and out of it), then turned on me over a disagreement when I tried to help in the environmental group (I'm a lawyer and tried to help with legal work/give legal advice). She would contact my partner and others in the group and tell my partner very negative things about me and my partner would seem to support this.
Again I couldn't understand this but my partner told me I was the problem. This went on for some months and then me and my partner began having arguments as my partner spent all her time with this woman and we no longer spent time together.
This woman now was now bad mouthing me a lot and telling my partner to leave me and my daughter. She seemed to have aot of control over my partner (my partner even became vegan at 37yrs old perhaps influenced by this woman who was vegan- that's a positive thing tho!!)which meant my partner felt guilty for being/spending time with me. My partner could not tell this woman any positives about me because she did not want to hear this. This woman was in our lives for about 5 months at this point. It took its toll around January and I was struggling mentally as I felt something was wrong but was being told I was jealous etc.
I suggested relationship counseling to my partner to try and work out what was going on and any communication issues. We did this for a couple of sessions and then this woman called me and left a voicemail saying that the counselor doesn't know what she is doing and my partner should not attend a d should listen to her not a counsellor (the woman was a former police officer with no counselling experience). My partner cancelled counselling and blamed the counsellor.
I explained I found this voicemail upsetting but again my partner defended the woman and made me feel I was the one doing something wrong. This happened everytime the woman criticised me, my partner defended the woman, I didn't really know the woman very well but always tried to include in our friend group and invite her to parties etc as she was my partners friend. I started feeling low about things, tried to talk to my partner and the woman told my partner that this was my issue and she shouldnt support me.
It got to the point where my partner did everything for this woman and would barely spend time with me.
Then in march this year my partner told me that she actually was enamored by this woman and had sexual feelings for her. She told the woman this too but it wasn't reciprocated as the woman was hetrosexual.
I was upset but things made sense now and I was open and understanding. My partner said she was confused and wanted us to be in each others lives still.
I agreed as we had lot of connection and I loved her a lot. I never told her to stop being friends with this woman. However she said she doesn't really see the woman anymore. My partner told me she was upset and alone on her birthday so I made her a vegan cake, went round and saw her on the back of a motorbike with this woman.
I walked away and got upset and sent text messages saying how could you lie etc. (I accept that wasn't great of me). Then my partner went away for the weekend with this woman. Prior to this and prior to her meeting the woman, the woman had told my partner to mute my calls and texts so she could respond when she wanted. My partner did this so she was ignoring me and only responding when she felt like it and was telling me that this was ok. I thought this was stonewalling me and I was asking for it to stop and for us to be honest and kind, she was telling me it was fine. I tried to talk about things but although we were hanging out a lot and still in each others lives she was refusing to talk about how I felt and said it made her feel bad if I wanted to talk. So the stonewalling would happen, sometimes be stonewalled sometimes be enthusiasticaly talked too. I was being told this was all ok and she would agree to talk to get some clairity to move forward but would then always cancell the talks and just want to talk about light hearted things. I was trying to explain I'm struggling with the confusion and the sometimes being ignored and sometimes not. But it was like she didn't want to hear this, she was still hanging around with this woman but was now saying the experience was just a little crush that's passed and no big deal. She never told our friends about this. I got really upset and sent her a text stating how I felt and she was making me feel...I realise that wasn't cool because I'm responsible for my feelings. She said this was abusive that I was telling her how she was making me feel and this made her feel bad. I acknowledged that. She has again been on holiday with this woman. I had a friend of the woman contact me and told me that the woman was trying to influence people against me.
I just want to know if this behaviour from my now ex partner has been ok and if it's normal or if anyone has experienced this?
I really appreciate any advice.
Thank you 🙏